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Inmate property that is lost, stolen or destroyed costs Ohio taxpayers more than $150,000 a year
in claims reimbursement and diverted staff time, according to a new report that also says the cost
is growing.

Inmates lose property when they’re transferred from one cell to another, keep property in
unsecured storage areas or have it stolen by other prisoners, said the report by Ohio’s
Correctional Institution Inspection Committee.

The losses can hurt inmates’ legal outcomes when important documents go missing and also result
in time and money taken away from the corrections system, said the report issued earlier this
month.

Inmates’ property can include family photos, mail, legal papers, hygiene items, electronic items
such as radios and food from the prison commissary.

“To Ohio taxpayers, this results in state dollars that are spent not on rehabilitation and
correction, but on unnecessary compensation,” the report said.

A 2010 internal audit of Oregon’s prison system found $538,743 paid to settle civil claims for
lost, confiscated or withheld property over nine years. California, which just began a system for
documenting property losses, paid about $1,600 last year in prisoner property claims.

In Ohio, an inmate at Madison Correctional Institution in London sued in the state Court of
Claims for $81.48 after a CD player, a bottle of scented oil, soup and stamped envelopes were
stolen from his cell when he was pulled out for disciplinary reasons in September 2011.

The prisoner, John Thomas, was cleared of any rule breaking, and a judge sided with him,
awarding him $82.49, which included an estimated cost of the lost property plus a $25 filing fee,
according to a July court filing.

Court of claims records also show numerous inmates had their claims denied but only after
several months of back-and-forth filings.

The Department of Rehabilitation and Correction paid out $114,350 from 2007 through 2011 in
reimbursement claims, the report said.